How to Make a Short Film (4 Steps to think about before rolling the camera) 🧠

Before you ask How to make a short film, there’s something else you should be asking, the million-dollar question! Whether the audiences will be interested in my story or not?

I’ve converted this blog into a short video if that’s your format of choice. Just Jump over to here

The first thing most short filmmakers think about is what camera they’ll be using or how grand the production design is going to be or what kind of lights and equipment they’ll be using.

These are generally the most common questions, short filmmakers ask themselves when on the contrary the very first question they should ask is if someone out there will give a damn about their story or not? And the million-dollar answer is a bit complicated.

It’s simple, yet not so simple.

The simple answer to this question is to take a look at your story then go on the internet, search for similar stories and see if those kinds of stories were successful with the audiences or not.

If they clicked with the audience, then you have a better chance of making your own story click, but if those stories didn’t connect with a significant number, then you’re better off leaving your story and moving on to work on another one.

Now comes my favorite answer, the answer that is not so simple.

I spent years and years of my life asking how to make a short film and making them as good as I could in the hopes of gathering an audience and enticing them to watch my next short film.

Was I successful? Hell no! not even by a long shot.

Because I failed to address the 4 steps to think about before writing and producing my stories.

1) I failed to address that the audience which I was targeting belonged to the internet. I kept on making short films that were much closer to feature films in their narrative style. Since I was tremendously inspired to become a feature film director I was always subconsciously telling stories with the perspective of a theatrical release whereas my short films were not getting released in cinemas, they were getting released on the internet and the internet audience is just miles and miles apart from a cinema audience which brings me to my second point.

2) My short films were just too long. Some of the movies I directed were 10 minutes long, some were 15 and in some cases, my movies were up to 20 minutes long. Nobody on the internet is going to stick around that long to watch your short film until and unless point number three.

3) You have to build an audience before releasing your short film. Just like how marketing executives for feature films market their films in order to build audience interest in the story. In today’s day and age, you have to market your story through social media channels in order to build audience interest in your short film.

There’s an amazing channel on YouTube that most filmmakers probably already know about. It’s called Film Riot hosted by Ryan Connolly. One of the short films that he made was around 30 minutes long and when he released it online, it got over 550,000 views. He was able to do that because he built a passionate audience before releasing his film, which brings me to my next and final point.

4) How to build an audience? Now I’m somebody who is currently trying to build an audience myself so clearly, I cannot give you any guidelines on it whatsoever. But there’s an amazing channel called Video Creators hosted by the amazing Tim Schmoyer who will absolutely walk you through the journey of growing from 0 audience members to a big bold figure.

I hope that you’ll be able to look at the question ‘How to make a short film’ from a new perspective and approach your stories much more strategically.

On a closing note, I’m going to repeat myself from my previous blogs. I’m a storyteller who is trying to connect with filmmakers and storytellers worldwide, so if you’re reading this blog and if you’re a director, if you’re a producer, if you have a team, if you have the resources or you can put together the resources and if you’re genuinely interested in making short films and then moving on to doing much bigger things together, then I’m genuinely interested in providing a story and a screenplay for you to work with. Simply get in touch with me through the comments section below.